I think thats where our disconnect is. I'm talking about the hardware in the phone itself.

You shouldn't have those issues because your OnePlus is a US version made for US markets, so has the proper bands/antennae to work fully on our networks and take advantage of things like 5g.

The same phones sold in China are not likely to have these to save money because they aren't necessary.

It's not "Chinese phones bad", but "imported phones usually lack US-specific hardware". OnePlus is a notable exception to this because they make phones for the US, unlike companies like Xiaomi. Which is why I keep mentioning that buying from their US store is fine.

This is also why imported phones may have trouble with activation. They're not recognized by some US carriers or blacklisted, like Huawei, to where they don't work or you may need to activate the SIM in a compatible phone and then swap it to your real one.

I wasn't recommending against Chinese phones at all. And I made the mistake of assuming OP/anyone reading was in the US, when they might be from Europe or elsewhere where the phones work fine.

But you can find a lot of other people experiencing poor reception issues with imported phones. It isn't just me.

I said I have a OnePlus 12 and its great. But it has full band support because OnePlus makes domestic versions of phones in other markets.

Last I looked on GSM Arena, there's like 1 Xiaomi device that has this, and many other Chinese brands are also lacking the specific bands.

If you're looking at Xiaomi anyway, look at getting a OnePlus. The 13 just came out, but the 12 and 12r are very good phones.

The 12 has all the US WiFi bands, I'm not sure about the rest. Its the best phone I've ever owned. The 12r has significantly more custom ROM support.

They sell them direct to US markets through their website.

But thats the main issue with importing a Chinese version of those phones or importing a Xiaomi is that your signal will be terrible when everyone else is fine. Then some carriers may have trouble activating the phone for you.

I really don't recommend buying a phone without US carrier support or WiFi bands to save yourself a lot of trouble.

The main problem with Google is their phones are objectively worse hardware wise to just about every other brand at the same price, whereas their cameras are really good and they lean hard into AI software and are very custom ROM friendly.

Samsung doesnt explode anymore but has frequent camera issues (look for Banana gate) and is very locked down. They have excellent hardware and their expensive phones lean into the stylus.

I work with young people and the organization has used the words "steal" when referring to piracy of copyrighted works before. So I think their impression is that I'm a potential corrupter of the youth.

But they're wrong, because I always tell them not to visit Anna's Archive under any circumstances. And I do it verbally to really get the message through.

I'm so used to piracy being normal that I've legitimately made people uncomfortable a few times with just a casual mention. At work. Which like maybe its not the best place to be talking about it but come on.

Once I recommended a show and someone asked what streaming service it was on, and I said I didn't know because I pirated it. They said 'oh' and got visibly uncomfortable.

We were chatting about our hobby projects over the Summer and I talked about my home server in really vague details since its boring nerd shit, then people asked of I was like ripping all my media or where I got it from. Said I pirated it all, then it got real quiet.

I know everyone in my work likes to think we actually help the world (we dont) and that our employees are good/moral people (a lot of them aren't) but I'm willing to bet 80% of them have watched a movie online before Netflix was popular.

The app keeps trying to recommend me people fishing and slaughtering pigs and stuff. Also a lot of users doing things with/to their pets that are not outright abuse but are stupid, uncomfortable, and unsafe.

Yeah, its from Red Note

Peep what happened in Portland, OR when the scooters got out of control and people showed they couldn't be responsible with them. People started throwing them off of bridges into the river, or on top of inaccessible business roofs.

Other people collected them and turned them back in hoping for reward money, even using grappling hooks and other goofy things to pull them off the roofs they weren't allowed on.

They're a menace for pedestrians, especially if you live anywhere near a college campus.

Frauddogg left after being outed as a former US soldier and arguing with a user from a country the US invaded while still calling them a cracker and a settler. Nobody did anything.

Chat is this real?

Show

For sure. The order is Season 1 and 2 of the original 90s series, Fire Walk With Me, then the newer Twin Peaks: The Return.

If you haven't seen Twin Peaks the series, season 1 and 2, I don't really recommend starting with Fire Walk With Me. Its technically a prequel and its going to not make a ton of sense while also spoiling things that happen later in the tv show. Including the main mystery and plot hook of Season 1.

Just about every game I've ever played has regional servers meaning that US players never get to interact with people from other countries, often not even English speaking Europe. There's only a few exceptions to that like EVE Online and their large Russian communities, but even then the groups tend to self-segregate.

Things might be different if everyone was just always forced to play together.

In Fable 3, all your political decisions as a monarch come down to "Do X or Y" based on what your advisors tell you. X is either 'do nothing' or 'do something reasonable as opposed to Y' and Y is the worst thing you can think of.

For example, one decision is "what do we do with all the poor children on the streets, of which you were once a part of?" and X is OPEN A SCHOOL while Y is INSTATE CHILD LABOR FOR THE CAPITALIST WORMTONGUE FIGURE.

Much nuance.

Type "Uyghur" into the search, I dare you. The results are truly horrifying. People sharing fashion, food, and music from their culture. Don't they know they're being enslaved? That they're living in The Truman Show?

Me still saying I can type 90+ WPM like I'm special

Show

My boss typing at 150 WPM and consistently beating me at typeracer

Show

I think some are worried about some silly zoomer later becoming a senator and now the government has all this dirt on them from harvesting their private messages and other info to be able to blackmail them into doing what China wants.

Which is also very far fetched and ridiculous.

Spoilers if you haven't already read/watched the trilogy and know the general outcomes of events. This is from my 50th anniversary edition, but the foreward is much older when Tolkien was still actively editing editions of his book to correct mistakes.

Show

I just had a bunch of Hasan-adjacent Twitch streamers on my front page of xiaohongshu. Pokimane is on there. Can't wait to see Hollywood celebrities next.

The Bazzite devs all use and suggest Lutris themselves for anything that isn't Epic, and none of them use Bottles. I have no opinion and also use Lutris, but if OP wants help from them officially, that's gonna be their suggestion.